Monday, November 30, 2009

Camus



those two or three great and simple images in whose presence his heart first opened.

I have been thinking about this quote, and so many other things for a few weeks now. I am reconnecting with the divinity inside of me that is wider than raising my children and the PTA. I love the image of you being a house with many rooms in which to keep things. Those of you who have seen my house know that there is usually a lot of clutter. And you need to sift through a bunch of junk to find the truly useful and meaningful. I have started doing that with our house. Our living room even has our couch, lovingly bathed in red corduroy IN it as opposed to propped up in a corner on the front porch! I have a place to sit on Sunday and read the New York Times with coffee and orange juice and yell at Meet the Press. And these are no small things. They have given my everyday reality enough roots so that I can open myself up to the other rooms and unearth what is hiding.

Enough metaphor. My artistic side has been hiding, hidden for quite some time. I had delusions of Mothering grandeur when I first started this parent gig. I was going to cloth diaper my children, read to them, bathe them in lavender oil and respond to their every need with love, calm and rapt attention. Okay, I will pause here while my mother-friends clean up the coffee with too many sugars that they just spit onto their computer monitor or keyboard. Done? Okay, resuming. My heart, my mind, my chakras (a wink at ADS) are opening up. And it is luscious and overwhelming. Remember my post about desiring to live in the liminal - to live and feel each moment in sacred space? Cannot do it. Not possible. There is laundry and pick ups and playdates. And there can be years (for me 10)of just getting through the day. ART - takes a backseat.

I used to find it incredibly pretentious when people referred to themselves as "artists." Really? Who the hell are you? And now I realize that it takes a great deal of courage to admit, out loud, that you want to make the world a more beautiful place. That you are essentially an idealist which in mainstream parlance equals naive. You paint a huge target on yourself to receive ridicule and to be taken advantage of. It's a brave and bold move. And I always hated when people did it because I was not feeling particularly "artistic" for a good deal of my life. Jealousy really at their opportunity. But that is not fair. And I remember that being an artist means infusing your life with beauty. Ah.

Back to Camus. I have recently remembered all the images, touches, and sounds in whose presence my heart first opened up. There are so many. And remembering them has been lovely and painful. And so worth it. Think about this today - when do you remember your heart first opening up? You may find that there have been so many times and I hope each one of them causes you to smile. I tend to feel things very deeply when I allow myself to feel them, so it has been an intense couple of weeks. We Leos never do anything small. And my 100 Angels have rallied around me to bring me into the next part of my life. Filled with conscious beauty, discipline and dare I say it - art? Join me there.

Friday, November 20, 2009

My Hierophant - Upright and Reversed



I have mourned the death of my father over and over again. In small ways and in big ways. It might have been easier on me if I had mourned him fully when he first died but that was highly inconvenient. I hold onto grief and let it out when I can no longer hold it in anymore. And it is always inconvenient. But not this time. I am in mourning right now and it hurts - bad. Someone I love very much is sick and it is not easy for them but it is even harder on me. I know talk about selfish. When I was sick I was really worried about other people. I wanted them to be comforted and cared for because I knew my cancer really hurt them and made them feel lost and out of control. I remember a good friend crying in my presence after I told her of my diagnosis. She got angry with herself and said that I shouldn't be comforting her. But yes, I should have been comforting her. Because she was probably sad about me but ultimately she was sad about her own mortality and looking at the fact that she would have to live if I died and she would have to go through a lot of pain when and if that happened. No one signs up for the kind of pain. And I have spent the better part of my life keeping real emotion, real feeling at bay. But I can't keep it back - not with this person.

My love of my hierophant is deep and abiding. I met him right after my own father died and he immediately became the father I always wished I had. I haven't seen him in years and I have missed that connection with him but getting back in touch has been difficult. It has required me to come to grips with his mortality. And it has required me to lose my father again. I realize that the older I get the more people will leave my life. And I am also too old to postpone these feelings.

I watched two minutes of Oprah the other day. Oprah was interviewing Kate Hudson. I stopped the DVR long enough to hear an actually interesting conversation. Oprah asked Kate what Joy meant to her. She said that the one thing she learned from her mother was to live every emotion - fully. That means the sad things too. To go into them and live there. I've said before that I am afraid of those emotions because I may not be able to come back from there. But the more often I make the trip the easier the return trip will be. Ideally. And I have to believe that - have faith in that. I don't have faith in much and I believe even less.

Yet, here I am. And here I will stay. It is up to me how the next evolution will be spent. And like a foot that has fallen asleep, it hurts coming back to life. I think even more when that thing is your soul.

in peace